The Great Partnership: Science, Religion, and the Search for Meaning – A Study of the Thought of the Late Rabbi Jonathan Sacks
The late Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks of blessed memory was a religious thinker and public intellectual of magisterial breadth and depth who spoke powerfully time and again to the major issues of our time. The consideration of the proper relationship of religion and science has engaged thinkers since the classical period of the ancient world. Prior to the Modern era, a religious world view needed no defense, apology or explanation. However, as science advanced, some thinkers argued that scientific thinking alone is sufficient to explain and guide our world. At the dawn of the 21st century, a smaller subset of such scientistic thinkers, popularly known as the “new atheists,” more stridently argued that not only is religion an unnecessary artifact of earlier historical periods, but a dangerous and damaging epiphenomenon of human culture. It is this conversation that Rabbi Sacks enters to argue that religion is not only of ongoing relevance, but of human necessity to build the good society and endow individuals with lives of meaning and purpose.
In this short course, we will read Rabbi Sacks’ book, analyze his arguments, and better appreciate the partnered roles that religion and science play in our lives.
This reader was developed by Rabbi Benjamin J. Samuels.
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The Great Partnership: A Study of the Late Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks